Career

Playing

Boeheim was born in Lyons, New York. He graduated from Lyons Central High School. Boeheim enrolled in Syracuse University as a student in 1962 and graduated with a bachelor's degree in social science.[1] During his freshman year, Boeheim was a walk-on with the freshman basketball team. By his senior year he was the team captain and a teammate of All-American Dave Bing, his freshman roommate. The pair led coach Fred Lewis's Orange to a 22–6 overall win-loss record that earned the team's second-ever NCAA tournament berth. After graduating from Syracuse, Boeheim played professional basketball with the Scranton Miners of the American Basketball League, during which he won two championships[2] and was a second-team all-star (SU Athletics). While at Syracuse, he joined the Delta Upsilon fraternity.

Coaching

In 1969, Boeheim decided to coach basketball and was hired as a graduate assistant at Syracuse under Roy Danforth. Soon thereafter he was promoted to a full-time assistant coach and was a member of the coaching staff that helped guide the Orange to its first Final Four appearance in the 1975 NCAA Tournament.

In 1976, Danforth left to become head basketball coach and athletic director at Tulane University. A coaching search then led to naught, and Boeheim was promoted to be the head coach of his alma mater. Apart from his brief stint in the pros, Boeheim has spent his entire adult life at Syracuse as a student, player, assistant coach or head coach, a rarity in modern-day major collegiate athletics. In 1986 Boeheim was offered the head coaching job at Ohio State, but turned it down to stay at Syracuse.[16]

During a Syracuse vs. Georgetown game, Hoyas star Patrick Ewing was nearly struck by an orange, and he had often endured racist chants from white college students. Boeheim borrowed a microphone and threatened to forfeit the game if fans continued to throw objects at Ewing.[17]

In 39 years as head coach at Syracuse, Boeheim has guided the Orange to postseason berths, either in the NCAA or NIT tournaments, in every year in which the Orange have been eligible. The only times the Orange missed the postseason was in 1993, when NCAA sanctions barred them from postseason play despite a 20–9 record and in 2015 when Boeheim failed to meet compliance with NCAA rules within his program for a decade. During his tenure, the Orange have never had a losing season, have appeared in three NCAA national championship games (1987, 1996, and 2003) and have won the national title in 2003.

Boeheim has been named Big East coach of the year four times, and has been named as District II Coach of the Year by the National Association of Basketball Coaches ten times. In 2004, Boeheim received two additional awards. The first was during the spring when he was awarded the Clair Bee Award in recognition of his contributions to the sport of basketball. During the fall of the same year Boeheim was presented with Syracuse University's Arents Award, the University's highest alumni honor.

Boeheim's coaching style at Syracuse is unusual in that, whereas many highly-successful coaches prefer the man-to-man defense, he demonstrates an overwhelming preference for the 2–3 zone defense.[2][18]

In an exhibition game on November 7, 2005 against Division II school Saint Rose from Albany, New York, Boeheim was ejected for the first time in his career after arguing a call late in the first half in the Orange's 86–73 victory. He was also ejected from Cameron Indoor Stadium on February 22, 2014 against Duke after arguing a player control foul call on C.J Fair by referee Tony Greene.

NCAA violations and punishment

On March 6, 2015, the NCAA suspended Boeheim for the first nine games of the 2015–16 season and took away 12 scholarships over a four-year period, as a result of a multi-year investigation into the university's athletic programs. The program was forced to vacate a total of 101 wins from the 2004–2005, 2005–2006, 2006–2007, 2010–2011, and 2011–2012 seasons. Any game during those years where one or more of the players deemed to have been ineligible played. This constitutes the second-most wins ever permanently vacated by one program, behind the 113 wins vacated by Michigan.[21]

Upon two separate appeals, Boeheim's nine-game suspension was upheld as was the permanent vacating and erasure of 101 wins.[22][23] However, the number of scholarships lost by Syracuse was reduced to 8 over a four-year period, down from 12 over the same period.[22]

* The NCAA vacated 15 wins from the 2004-05 season, 23 wins from the 2005-06 season, 22 wins from the 2006-07 season, 7 wins from the 2010-11 season, and 34 wins from the 2011-12 season as a result of the Syracuse athletics scandal.[24]

** Boeheim's official NCAA record is 888-347 (.719), accounting for the aforementioned 101 vacated wins.

Accomplishments

Boeheim's notable accomplishments during his long and illustrious career:

Led Syracuse University to a national championship (2003)

Led Syracuse University to three national championship game appearances

Joined Mike Krzyzewski and Jim Calhoun as the third active coach with 800 wins.[29]

Coached the Orange to a six overtime win against the UConn Huskies, 127–117, the longest game in the history of Big East Conference play.[30]

Named 2010 Naismith Coach of the Year (along with the same honor from the AP, Sporting News and many others) after leading Syracuse to an unexpected 30–5 record.

On December 17, 2012 Boehiem became the third coach in NCAA men's basketball history to reach 900 wins, along with Bob Knight and Mike Krzyzewski.[31] 101 of those wins were vacated in 2015 after an NCAA investigation.

Coaching tree

These former assistant coaches or players of Boeheim later became head coaches at the collegiate level or higher.